The faculty at an elementary school in central Taiwan touted the efficacy of their "bat houses" yesterday. The bat houses were first set up on campus several years ago to fight bugs, and the faculty say that thousands of mosquitoes have been eaten each night ever since.
Chang Heng-chia (
Chang, who has the nickname "bat ace" after years of caring for the bats, said they got the idea from books explaining how insect populations can be reduced in a more eco-friendly way.
The first population to move into the bat houses was a group of Japanese house bats (pipistrellus abramus), a common species in East Asia, Chang said. They were later joined by myotis formosus flavus, a species endemic to Taiwan.
"The bats leave during winter and return when the temperature rises," Chang said. "Sometimes, in the summer, there are hundreds of bats inhabiting the houses at the same time. On a rough estimate, a bat can eat several hundred, or even a thousand, bugs every night."
Chang said the "bat method" is an effective and natural means of fighting the pests. In addition, the school's pupils have had a better chance to observe and understand these animals up close.
A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm early yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, less than a week after a typhoon barreled across the nation. The agency issued an advisory at 3:30am stating that the 22nd tropical storm, named Yinxing, of the Pacific typhoon season formed at 2am. As of 8am, the storm was 1,730km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, with a 100km radius. It was moving west-northwest at 32kph, with maximum sustained winds of 83kph and gusts of up to 108kph. Based on its current path, the storm is not expected to hit Taiwan, CWA
Residents have called on the Taipei City Government to reconsider its plan to demolish a four-decades-old pedestrian overpass near Daan Forest Park. The 42-year-old concrete and steel structure that serves as an elevated walkway over the intersection of Heping and Xinsheng roads is to be closed on Tuesday in preparation for demolition slated for completion by the end of the month. However, in recent days some local residents have been protesting the planned destruction of the intersection overpass that is rendered more poetically as “sky bridge” in Chinese. “This bridge carries the community’s collective memory,” said a man surnamed Chuang
A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm earlier today, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The 22nd tropical storm, named Yinxing, in this year's Pacific typhoon season formed at 2am, the CWA said. As of 8am, the storm was 1,730km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) with a 100km radius, it said. It was moving west-northwest at 32kph, with maximum sustained winds of 83kph and gusts of up to 108kph. Based on its current path, the storm is not expected to hit Taiwan, CWA meteorologist Huang En-hung (黃恩宏) said. However, a more accurate forecast would be made on Wednesday, when Yinxing is
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